‘Bridgegate’ mayor to attend SOTU

The mayor of the New Jersey town at the center of a traffic scandal troubling Republican Gov. Chris Christie’s administration will attend President Barack Obama’s State of the Union speech on Tuesday.

Fort Lee Mayor Mark Sokolich’s presence at the speech in Washington will be a visible reminder of the political firestorm that has erupted this month in New Jersey for Christie, a prospective 2016 presidential candidate.

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Lane closures near the busy George Washington Bridge last September paralyzed traffic in Fort Lee for days. Subpoenaed documents indicate that aides and allies of Christie were involved in triggering the closures.

Sokolich has questioned whether the lane closures were “punitive,” and Democrats have alleged they could have been tied to Sokolich’s failure to endorse Christie for re-election last year while the governor was seeking to build up bipartisan support.

Christie traveled to Fort Lee earlier this month to apologize to Sokolich over the traffic mess. The governor has denied involvement in any alleged retribution plot, however, and has dismissed those apparently involved.

Pascrell told The Record (N.J.) newspaper, which first reported the invitation, that for this year’s speech he wanted to invite a person from Bergen County, which is home to Fort Lee.

“He did exhibit a standup attitude [on the bridge issue] which I’ve grown to like and I can’t say I kept that out of my mind because that’s not the truth, but it’s not the reason he was selected,” Pascrell told the newspaper.

The Fort Lee mayor did not immediately respond to a request for comment from POLITICO on Monday.